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Mr. Martlew : Does my hon. Friend agree that it is unlikely that the police would dock a five-day-old puppy that they were going to take later? The dogs would never be docked because they would later be doing police work.

Mr. Jones: My hon. Friend is absolutely right and makes the point perfectly that that is not an argument in favour of the exemption.

I accept the evidence of the vets; they work with animals every day, see dogs with docked tails and have great suspicion about where those dogs have been docked and by whom. The only way in which this abuse will be stopped is if we have a total ban on docking, which I urge the House to support.

7 pm

Mr. Bellingham : It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Clwyd, South (Mr. Jones) and it is sad that we are not on the same side tonight. We have often debated countryside, shooting and rural issues and we have been on the same side. It is a great pity that we will not be tonight.

I have an interest to declare. I have owned dogs all my life. Since I was about 10, my family has had springers and cockers, and we have bred those dogs. It has always been accepted as a matter of fact that the working springers and cockers would have docked tails, for very good reasons. The dogs will go into thick undergrowth; they are natural hunters. I have seen docked springers and cockers coming out of thick undergrowth with blood and cuts on what is left of their tails. Those injuries heal quickly, but I have often wondered how much worse the injuries would have been if the dogs had not been docked at birth. I have always taken a great interest in this subject.

I also own a slightly old labrador called Tiffany. When she was younger, she was an active dog and had a habit of being in a good mood most of the time. She wagged her tail against different objects, such as doors and chairs. Her tail was in such a bad state that we nearly had to have it removed, or therapeutically docked. I am talking about a labrador with a tough tail; one can immediately see the difference between that and a spaniel's tail.

The difference was brought home to me when I thought about the dogs that are used by our security forces and by the police and which operate in confined spaces. If one comes in early to this place, one can see the dogs that work in this Chamber, the police sniffer dogs. They are in an extremely good mood and go careering round the Chamber, in a controlled fashion, in and out of tight spaces. If they had long tails, they would be banging them against every object in sight.
 
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Dr. Palmer : The hon. Gentleman and I share the pleasure of having a labrador. Would it not be logical to say that we should cut off the tails of all dogs, including labradors? Indeed, I notice that the hon. Gentleman, like me, uses his arm a good deal when he speaks. Should we not cut off his arm in case he injures it?

Mr. Bellingham: The hon. Gentleman slightly devalues his argument with his rather flippant remark. My point is that a labrador has a different tail from that of springers, cockers and some of the sheepdog breeds.

I was interested to hear what the hon. Member for Clwyd, South had to say about vets. I have a great deal of respect for the hon. Gentleman, who commands a great deal of respect in this House and is a Privy Council nominee to the council of the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons. In my constituency, the vets are divided on the issue. If one goes to a rural veterinary practice, one finds that vets are almost unanimously in favour of the status quo and of tail docking per se. In urban areas such as Norwich and King's Lynn, there are veterinary practices dominated by vets who are used to looking after smaller animals. They are not used to the countryside and have not spoken to the people there, who would be involved in countryside pursuits or farming. Those vets are mainly in favour of an outright ban.

One has to look carefully at the conclusion reached by vets and ask whether the decision is the result of the domination of that council by predominantly urban vets. Has the voice of the countryside been heard? I put that point to the hon. Gentleman, who is very wise on these matters.

Mr. Jones: I was trying to work out the numbers while the hon. Gentleman was speaking, but at least four members of the council are rural vets and all were in favour of a ban. There may be anecdotal evidence, and I am sure some vets are in favour of docking, but 91 per cent. of vets are against it; that figure must include quite a lot of rural vets.

Mr. Bellingham: I am interested in what the hon. Gentleman has said, which carries some weight, although I have discovered that my rural vets are in favour of the status quo.

Much misinformation has been put out by the Anti-Docking Alliance, the League against Cruel Sports and the RSPCA. I intervened on the excellent speech by my hon. Friend the Member for Leominster (Bill Wiggin), who went into this matter in great detail, and asked him about the e-mailed photographs that we have all received, some of which were quite disgraceful. They showed docked dogs with tails lying on the ground and older dogs that had been docked by amateurs. All those dockings would have been completely against the law. One must keep stressing the point that it has been illegal for the past 15 years or so for individual dog owners to dock a dog. It has to be done by a vet.

The issue of pain was discussed at some length. The hon. Member for Cleethorpes (Shona McIsaac) made a long speech and, to be fair, took a lot of interventions. I do not know whether she has seen a puppy being docked.

Shona McIsaac indicated assent.
 
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Mr. Bellingham: She has. I have seen puppies being docked by vets and I do not feel that there is any lasting pain. [Interruption.] One cannot be sure of that, but the puppies in question immediately went back in with the litter, showing no sign of distress whatever. These were puppies with their eyes shut. That procedure cannot be compared with the pain suffered as a result of therapeutic docking that might have to take place at a later stage. There is no comparison whatever.

Shona McIsaac: Does the hon. Gentleman accept that scientific evidence demonstrates that the neonatal puppy experiences the sensations of pain and, possibly, because of the nature of the neurological pathways, does so more intensely? People argue that because the puppies do not react, there is no pain, but there is very little a two-day old puppy can do apart from squeal. The puppies that I have seen docked certainly squealed when their tails were amputated. No one in this place, I hope, would argue that a neonatal puppy could have a paw or an ear cut off and not experience pain.

Mr. Bellingham: I am grateful to the hon. Lady for that intervention. I am not going to pursue this issue in detail, but the point is that I have seen puppies having their tails docked and although they may well suffer some temporary pain, they get over it very quickly indeed, settle back into the litter and show no signs of ongoing distress. They are not put off their food and they soon develop as normal, healthy dogs.

I am in favour of the status quo. On entering into this debate, I probably erred toward voting for a partial ban and voting against cosmetic docking, but I have been impressed by the arguments of my hon. Friends the Members for Hexham (Mr. Atkinson) and for Forest of Dean (Mr. Harper). It is already illegal for individual dog owners to dock their dogs. Dogs have to be docked by vets, so what we should have is proper enforcement of existing law. If the law was properly enforced, if—as my hon. Friend the Member for Hexham pointed out sensibly and with such imagination—pressure was put on the showing community to veer from cosmetic docking, and if the word went through the entire breeding community that kennel clubs and the various breeders do not approve of it, we would see a big reduction in cosmetic docking. I am also impressed by the arguments concerning bureaucracy, freedom of choice and the complications to which an outright ban would lead, which is why I am in favour of maintaining the status quo.

I am sorry that the Minister has been put in this    position. He gave various commitments to organisations such as the Countryside Alliance and the British Association for Shooting and Conservation. He spoke to them at length and told them that he would do all that he possibly could to ensure an exemption for working dogs. I am very sad that he has been unable to deliver on that.

Mr. Bradshaw: I can assure the hon. Gentleman and the House that I have never given any assurances on anything to the Countryside Alliance.

Mr. Bellingham: That is very interesting, because according to an article in The Times in 2004, the Minister had assured countryside rural sports
 
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organisations that there would be an exemption for working dogs. Whether such discussion included the Countryside Alliance, I do not know, but it certainly included a number of other organisations very close to it. It is a pity that the Minister, having said that he was standing up for the countryside and for freedom of choice in the countryside, has been unable to deliver.

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